Moral Character

The first Presidential Race I can remember was JFK v Richard Nixon. I was no more than knee-high to a grasshopper at the time and my primary motivation for campaigning for JFK was that he was much better looking than Nixon. Looking back, I was absolutely right about my choice albeit for the wrong reasons. I’ve carefully observed every Presidential Election since.

But, this primary season was the thrill ride of a political lifetime. Almost every Tuesday I was glued to the TV, channel flipping between MSNBC and CNN, and my fingernails are shorter than they have EVER been. What is striking to me as I look back at the whole process is how Democrats are, philosophically, more unified than I’ve ever known us to be.

One by one our candidates pushed for their particular flavor of universal health care, an end to the war in Iraq, an economic policy that could rescue American families from slavery 2.0, filing “No Child Left Behind” where it belonged in the first place, addressing Global Warming in a meaningful way and repairing what’s left of the tattered image of the US on the world stage.

You have to admit, being that unified in purpose is pretty rare for the Democratic Party. So my big question as the dust settles on the first phase of this election is, Why are we so divided? I’d like to have a go at that question and my answer is simple. Hillary Clinton.

The choices we had as Democrats this primary season wasn’t about policy at all. Barrack and Hillary are on the same page on almost EVERYTHING! This primary was about personality and character and the differences there are absolutely polar. Our choice was between hope and faith on one hand and pragmatism on the other! The fact that the contest came down to the very last voter is somewhat disturbing to me.

I blame Hillary for division in the party because she is a lightening rod for drawing fire. I don’t see it as having anything to do with her gender either. This woman is smart! Way smarter than me. By comparison, her cocktail napkin is a LITTLE smarter than me, but she’s a “take-no-prisoners” kind of leader.

I believe we don’t have universal health care right now because Hillary is a “Fighter” and fighters either win or lose, that’s what a fight is! But fighting doesn’t solve problems. I would hope that a man or woman as smart as Hillary would be able to see that. Barrack was able to see that a LONG time ago and he has built a movement that recognizes that dismissing opposition out of hand is what brought us here.

On the other hand, Hillary Clinton has changed America for the better. She’s right about the fact that women have waited too long for a real chance at the White House. So have African Americans! I sincerely hope that this uniquely American experience has settled the question of race and gender in leadership once and for all.

I believe that we made the right choice out of the options we were given because what the US needs most at this point in history is faith in our character as a nation. We need that even more than universal health care, more than education reform, more than,,,go down the list. All of that will naturally follow once we heal our minds, hearts and souls from the sickness of greed that has drawn us off course.

We once had pride in our moral judgment because our judgment was deeply rooted in strong moral values. We have lost that over the last four decades of leadership because our leadership has abandoned the moral compass that brought this unlikely experiment in Democracy from a fledgling handful of disgruntled English countrymen, to the greatest power on the planet in a little over 200 years.

Barrack and Michele Obama have shown us the character needed to lead this nation back to itself. They are leading us to a place where we respect that we are not perfect, we are not always right, and we are a much better people than we appear to ourselves AND the rest of the world. We are risk-taking pioneers who dream of a better world and set out to create it with our courage and our strength. We are a morally strong and resilient people who have, only momentarily, lost our way and this IS our moment in history to break out that map and get back on course. There are those who will say that we have gone to far to turn back now. To them, Barrack, Michele, Hillary and I say “Yes, We Can!”